A PSYCHO'S STYLE OF LEVELLING UP

Martin immediately began his mana absorption, following the exact instructions Sheila had explained to them.

He needed to direct the mana flow into his meridians.

Martin didn't think it would work because nothing had happened since he had been trying for the last few days.

"I wonder what's wrong?" Martin grunted after the fifth trial.

He had sat in the middle of the cave where mana density was the thickest, he was able to see the mana lines without even using Mama detection, so he quickly skipped to the next phase of the process.

Trying to absorb the mana wasn't working at all.

Martin rubbed his palm over his face as he thought of what to do next, suddenly he felt a light throbbing in his chest.

It was as if something was trying to speak to him, but what was it.

In the solitude of the cave, Martin suddenly felt restless as he felt another light throbbing in his chest.

The air was strange, and it wasn't because of the amount of mana signals in the air, but it was the little feeling of lumps that Martin felt in his throat.

Martin couldn't shake off this feeling of curiosity, and he took of his shirt to realize that there was a humming sound coming from his chest, specifically from the runic lines drawn in his chest.

Martin took a deep breath as he traced the lines on his chest, there was a soft ethereal glow coming from deep within in.

It was the same rune that held his lightning magic, so he wondered what would make the rune display such brightness.

Was it because of the lightning magic? Martin didn't think so because the light emitted would have been a purple glow.

The lines started to flicker, while Martin felt a strange warmth caressing every part of his body. This warmth was moving through the veins in his body burning him up yet providing some sort of indescribable comfort.

As his fingers traced the lines, he felt a soft vibration, it was as if the rune itself was trying to tell him something.

Suddenly the throbbing sound heightened causing him to fall into a trance, and displayed in that little vision was the mana pool which he had seen in the cave.

It was brighter than before, and it felt as if it was calling out to him.

Martin suddenly went into a trance, and an image was portrayed in his mind's eyes; it was the same image of the mana pool, just that it was brighter, and more sparkling.

Martin looked closer, realizing that there was someone in that pool, and that person was him. The moment the person turned his face to look at Martin, the image disappeared, and Martin left the trance.

Now he knew what he had to do. He stood up from his feet, and moved closer to the mana pool.

Staring down at the pool. Martin knew that he had to be careful.

"I should go in." Martin muttered, he immediately took off his clothes revealing his toned muscular body, his V-shaped waist, and his well detailed thighs. Martin would look like that normal human that had exercised for years to get such a shape but Martin had never exercised once in his life except that one time he wanted to try taekwondo in his old life.

He dipped his foot into the pool. Cold.

The low temperature of the mana sent a chill down his body, but as the throbbing in his chest increased as if excited by the prospect of getting such pure mana, Martin knew it was now or never, and he went right in.

"It's not really deep. I'd be able to sit down and meditate comfortably."

Martin thought loudly as he settled himself in the pool.

It was time to beginning the absorption process once again.

What Martin didn't expect was that as he soon as he opened his mind's eyes, the rune in his chest was once again awakened, and it started to suck in all the mana energy.

Mana waves entered through the symbolic lines of the runes as if they were destined to be there from the beginning.

Martin could feel the energy build up in his body, the chilling sensation was quickly replaced by a fiery heat as his passageways started to heat up.

His lightning rune was taking in too much energy, and it was getting hard for Martin's body to take in the full brunt of the force.

Martin tried to stop the intake but he soon found out that he wasn't the one performing the absorption of mana.

It was the work of the rune that his grandfather's locket had given him.

The rune was giving him more than he could handle, so he did what he knew best—Taking advantage.

Martin could handle the pain for a while as he thought, he needed a way to cheat the rules.

He had a mana sucking rune, and his mana pool was almost filled up.

A normal cultivator or human would get out of the mana water immediately, or better still they would use the energy to kick out their own energy, and fill up their passage ways with the plentiful amount of pure energy which was definitely the best option still only a handful of talented ones could do this, so the wisest choice was to stop.

But Martin had a different set of nuts screwed into his brain.

Now Martin had come to this place because he wanted to increase his cultivation, and the only way he could do that was by quickly mastering his spells, and breaking through to a new level.

However he now had a much deadlier plan, he was going to stick with what he had thought of before which was increase his spell tiers.

First of all, this was a big risk as he could cripple his cultivation.

Secondly, He could rupture his energy passageways, and die in a lonely cave where no one would think to visit in a hundred years except maybe for Ace.

Furthermore, he was Martin, he was slightly insane if not completely, the richest man in his world, if he didn't push through the risks, he would definitely regret it, and he had to be able rub his power in a lot of people's face.

Martin's idea was to make more meridians, which was technically impossible due to the natural amount of twelve meridians connected to the human core.

The human core was the base of meridian, it was like the beast mana stones the way it gathered in mana to form the human mana pool.

Martin knew what he was doing was risky, but that was the fun part of it all—Playing a dangerous game with death.

He took in a deep breath, and got ready. He needed to create another core in his body to access the mana.

Martin had read of this technique in the same dark book he had seen the blood contract he used to bind Ace.

The purity of the mana was at an extreme level, so he had to be very careful, even the slightest mistake could cause his actual core to blow up, and end up crippling his cultivation or worse killing him.

Martin started to move the mana in his already filled up core to the left side of his body. Slowly yet steadily, he severed a passage way leading to his heart* causing a slight pain to move through his boy but he had mentally prepared himself. (The heart is also called a core.)

After making the incision, and separating the passage way. Martin needed to move the entrance of the pathway to his heart.

Letting the mana flow to that empty area, he decided to make photocopies of his meridians, and cover them with the mana his rune was absorbing.

Naturally, no human would be able to this, but Martin had the purest of mana at the tip of his fingers, and the purer the mana, the faster it was to become dense.

The phenomenon behind the liquid mana was still unknown.

Finally, after a few excruciatingly painful moments, Martin finally created a new core.

Now he could strengthen his magic.

Meanwhile upstairs in Martin's apartment…

Ace laid staring at the ceiling with heaps of cereal cartons around him with one thought in his head,

"Where the f**k is that psycho?"